Maintenance for the week of September 8:
• PC/Mac: No maintenance – September 8
• PC/Mac: EU megaserver for maintenance – September 9, 22:00 UTC (6:00PM EDT) - September 10, 16:00 UTC (12:00PM EDT) https://forums.elderscrollsonline.com/en/discussion/682784
Actually I'm from the American Continent and I can play with them just fine. It's just a matter of being around at the same times. Not really huge difference anyway.
The meeting was perfect by the way, will post screenshots soon.
Edited by OneWithTheShadows on July 26, 2015 10:21PM
The secrecy kills me!
I can only say this: the further you progress into the guild, the more it becomes truly interesting.
Stay tuned for more events upcoming.
"The opportunity to secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself."
Sun Tzu
Just dropped in to say the guild is the most active it has ever been!
We now have many members and therefore we had to start organising the guilds by cells so as to provide opportunities for people to create and participate in their own events.
Our forums have also experienced notable growth, with some really cool fan fictions as well as other pieces of creative writing popping from our members!
I'm going to end with a screenshot of our last event, involving the Cartel dealing with some slavers in Kragenmoor. We ended up dealing with some Dres retainers and some pretty bad injuries. Overall, just another day in the Cartel!
"The opportunity to secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself."
Sun Tzu
Let's reflect on the year that passed, shall we? What have we accomplished so far during 2015?
On March 31st 2015, Blackrose Cartel was founded and original version of our storyline was created by the fabolous almighty leader of universe, humble Xeirseus , aka me! Guild started to gather support rapidly since the beginning, but we weren't even close to being a RP guild. Only condition to enter the guild was to read and like the storyline, nothing else. Once you joined nothing happened. I had an idea about this guild in my head, but I couldn't make the "wheels start spinning" all by myself. Guild was practically dead and without any real purpose. By August Cartel had 60 members, and I even started to think about disbanding the guild, believing that my idea is dead and that I failed. Then I got a strange PM on ESO website, where a player from NA megaserver wished to move to EU one just to join this guild. That player, named @OneWithTheShadows, was so fascinated by the storyline (which changed once during his arrival), that he moved from NA server to EU one just to be a part of this. When he came he was visibly disappointed by inactivity of the guild, but when he heard all my ideas, he promised to help me with it. After some discussions between us, I decided to completely reorganize the guild, making what some older members (*winks at Fuzzy and Darkius*) might know as "New Blackrose Cartel". I made probably most important MotD of all times for this guild, asking everyone to edit their note saying if they are interested in real roleplay and that they have 48h to answer. Out of 60 members maybe 20 replied, 15 of which said that they *ARE* interested in RP, only one of them still being our member is @FuzzyNinjaLama (and me of course, but I'm not counted here ). At that point I've been a member of Great House Redoran for some time, and it's there that I learnt basics of RP and my famous /idle2 walk . One of my Redoran friends, @rindlchen, whisped me that someone in EPRP asked to join an Argonian guild and that he told him about me. Soon after a player named @Darkius whisps me if he could join my RP guild although he isn't much experienced in it. Of course, he was accepted and that very day he joined I summoned a guild meeting in Stormhold Outlaws Refuge. On that meeting were @OneWithTheShadows, @FuzzyNinjaLama, @Darkius and most handsome of them, Xinz'r, aka me . I tasked @OneWithTheShadows to talk about our ideas with the players (for the first time Blackrose Cartel members talked to each other IC!), while I was kicking members. While he was talking, I kicked 45/60 members, and when I was done I whisped him to finish it ASAP and give me the word. When he did, I told players that Blackrose Cartel was dead up until then and that it's time to rise the guild from ashes. Told them that I kicked 75% of the guild, and that things will change. That we will become real RP guild, with tests being made for every new player wishing to join. I remember that the meeting ended with me saying "Welcome to New Blackrose Cartel." That's when things started to rapidly change. Soon OneWith TheShadows left for unknown reasons, but his assistance enabled me to make the guild somehow stand on its legs, still barely alive. Darkius ranked up very fast, always asking about the storyline, asking about details and wanting to know everything. Soon he rose up to be a member of Echo of Silence, and later even reached EoS Nameless, and immediatelly after that EoS Emissary, becoming my right hand and advisor. After some time, when I saw that House Redoran has 150 members, of which only 30ish were active, I didn't want to have such a guild, so I introduced "Purity" policy - policy according to which, if you are inactive for 7 days, get kicked out of the guild because as far as I know you quit ESO. Also, according to it, if the kicked player returns, all (s)he has to do is to whisp/mail me, and they will get their invite and old rank back.
One of the things that made us one of the better, if not one of the best EU EP roleplaying guilds, is that I, and later also Darkius, forced that Cartel's RP is made by Cartel, and not to depend on someone else's events in order to stay active. It proved to be very good and profiting for us, because we were founded, grew and became a good guild, all without EPRP's events. We were and still are completely independent - thing that not many guild can say, you know. To us EPRP's events were always some kind of bonus, which most players didn't want to go anyway since Cartel's RP is more interesting than tavern RP (which is most of their RP events). This is one of the things that I'm very proud of as a leader - that we have self-sufficient RP community that can exist on its own without slightest problems. Second thing which also made us good is that from the very beginning, I forced that all IC secrets are also kept OOC from other members, so that revealing them have actual shock value OOC and IRL when heard.
Now, to skip the details - what did change? What did we accomplish and what is Blackrose Cartel now?
a) Well, one fact is sure - we are (according to what I heard), probably most complicated guild when it comes to guild structure. We have tests, initiations and various procedures for players to join the guild or to rank up. This accomplished making our guild really "pure" ("Purity", alongside being independent, is my top priority in leading Blackrose Cartel), because we have no trolls, no noobs, no inactive players, and no "bank cleaners" here. No troll, no noob, and no bank cleaner will get in all that trouble to join us just to troll or robb us, and noobs that apply to become candidates either quit when they see what is asked of them, or they stop being noobs and become real RPers and join the guild.
b) We are really pure guild, and that's one thing that other guild leaders often compliment us about, saying that it takes courage to lead such a policy. But hey, it made us have serious reputation, which draws good roleplayers.
c) We have 4th and probably final version of our storyline, which is completely lore-friendly and has some hidden unexplained-on-purpose parts.
e) New addition to my "Purity" policy is that from now on candidates' notes will be edited upon their joining with date saying when did they join and they will have one week to do the test or they get kicked for failing the test.
And now some fun facts that you probably didn't know!
a) Cartel's original tabard wasn't red like now, but was yellow! Yeah, very bright shade of yellow, but was changed after I decided to make it RP guild and that yellow wouldn't suit criminals, Sithis priests and... something else that happens in EoS , so I went for dark red instead.
b) Guild's tabard actually has a meaning and can be explained, and Xinz'r explains it to you IC when you reach rank EoS Nameless.
c) I seriously thought about disbanding the guild just a few days before it started to grow and succeed rapidly.
d) EoS Code in our storyline section, is actually only known thing to outsiders of it both IC and OOC!
e) Original idea was that EoS and BC are actually two separate guilds, but since I can lead only one, it's put in one
f) Icons of ranks also have a meaning and are explained after becoming EoS Nameless.
g) EoS actually has its own chat ingame, with "officer" chat being used for that purpose, since I want to make EoS function completely as guild within guild
That's all folks, hope you enjoyed this and that I wasn't too thourough! Let's make year 2016 even better than this one!
And our leader is still as humble as the first day.
*rolleyes*
Happy New Year Cartel.
"The opportunity to secure ourselves against defeat lies in our own hands, but the opportunity of defeating the enemy is provided by the enemy himself."
Sun Tzu